SF Cyclotouring

11/28/2006

Carlos and I rode out to the Woodacre Deli for lunch -- their excellent sandwiches are worth the 53 mile trip! This was also the first ride on the RB-1 with the new higher/wider handlebar setup...definitely more comfy!

33-mile Marin Headlands ride with Carlos. Up Conzelman, down Coastal Trail to Miwok Trail, over to Miwok Stables, 2nd loop out Coastal Trail, then back to the Stables and ride out Tennessee Valley Road to Sausalito, then back home across the bridge. Got some nasty chainsuck on the Bontrager, and discovered that the Z2 fork "clinks" when it bottoms out. Man, I hate chainsuck -- and the paint on my Bonty was nearly pristine before this happened! I'm thinking someone needs to make a thin stainless-steel plate that you can clamp over the right chainstay to act as a "chainsuck shield".

11/19/2006

Today Dawn and I hopped on our bikes and checked out the Velo Rouge Cafe for breakfast, then we rolled over to Golden Gate Park to spectate at the Pilarcitos CX races that were held there. Cyclofiend (cyclofiend.com) and Jeff Hantman (Cliffbar) competed in a couple of the races, and we cheered them on.

11/08/2006

Rode across the GGB and up to the top of Conzelman, then back down and took Coastal Trail down to Bunker Road, through the tunnel to Sausalito Lateral, then back up to the bridge and back home. First non-commute ride after my knee injury; knee worked better than I feared but not as well as I'd hoped, with some twinges of pain during the ride, but (as of the next day) no ill after-effects. Also first ride with Marzocchi Z2 fork, it worked really well.

11/07/2006

My wife and I have been somewhat-casually house shopping for the past several months. We currently rent a great 2-bedroom flat in a house owned by a longtime friend, with a new basement garage, generous storage space, and even an entire basement room set up as a bike workshop. I'm somewhat loathe to give all that up, but I think we've both reached the point in our lives where we want a home that's ours -- a place that we can configure to suit us and something that feels (mostly) permanent. At any rate, I think we're looking for something to buy that's fairly similar to our current place.

A major issue for me/us in our house-shopping endeavours is obviously storage space for multiple bikes. Unfortunately, real-estate listing services (MLS) seem to generally indicate that a property has so many bedrooms/bathrooms, maybe the total number of rooms and square footage, any parking and whether it's tandem or independent...and if you're lucky they'll mention any additional storage. However they never indicate the size of the storage! The only way to find this out is to go to the open house and do some poking around. A couple of places we've looked at have had really nice partitioned storage rooms that are actually large enough to store a few bikes plus set up a workshop in. Other places simply have a too-small closet sectioned off by plywood or fencing. Or worse, there's no additional storage at all!

I just wish this information was included in the property listings...it'd certainly help us narrow down the choices and make better use of our time as we do the "Sunday Mad Dash" trying to get to as many open houses as possible between 2pm and 4pm.

Several months ago (last year mebby?) I bought this fork via Ebay. I'd grown frustrated with trying to keep my Manitou 3 fork running -- parts are getting pretty scarce -- and I'd heard that these Z2 forks are pretty bulletproof, low maintanence, work great, and parts are still available (kudos to Marzocchi)! The right fork leg had a pretty bad oil leak, so I sent it back to Marzocchi's USA offices in Valencia, CA and they rebuilt it for $60, so it should be good to go for a while. At any rate, I finally got around to installing the fork a couple of weekends ago.

I took this bike out for a short 20-mile mixed-roads ride this past Sunday, and it worked great. The Z2 rides very differently than the M3 fork -- much more active, plush, and longer travel. It pogos when honking out of the saddle, but I guess that's to be expected. It's also HEAVIER -- the bike gained about 1.5lbs from the fork swap.